1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to image processing. More specifically, the present invention relates to a method and apparatus for processing very high resolution images or very high frame rate images in real time.
2. Description of the Prior Art
A blob is an area of touching pixels with the same logic state. All pixels in an image that belong to a blob are in a foreground state. The remaining pixels in the image are in a background state. In a binary image, pixels in the background have values equal to zero, while every nonzero pixel is part of a binary image. Blob analysis is typically used to detect blobs in an image and make selected measurements of these blobs within the image. Blob analysis consist of a series of processing operations and analysis functions that produce information about 2-dimensional shape in an image.
Image processing generates large quantities of data at very high bandwidths. Currently, it is very difficult to process this data in real time using conventional data processing techniques.
Blob analysis is performed on images using recursive algorithms. This requires the algorithm used for blob analysis to make multiple passes through the image. When multiple passes are required, the whole video frame must be stored in memory. The memory requirements and multiple passes make it difficult to perform the task in real time.